The Scientific Method: Escondido author brings attention to medieval Muslim scientist

By: RUTH MARVIN WEBSTER - Staff Writer | Saturday, April 7, 2007 8:11 PM PDT ∞

The author of 27 nonfiction books for children, including biographies of Emily Dickinson and J.K. Rowlings, Escondido resident Bradley Steffens had never become as engrossed in a subject as he did with his latest one.

By Steffens' own admission, the medieval Muslim scientist Ibn al-Haytham struck a chord in him none of his other subjects had.

Written for young adults in grades six to 12, "Ibn al-Haytham: First Scientist" ($27.95, Morgan Reynolds Publishing, 2007) is one biography in a series called Profiles in Science. The slim volume chronicles the life and work of one of the Middle East's greatest scientists.

Born in 965 in the city of Basra (in present-day Iraq), al-Haytham is best known for his contributions to the principles of optics and the use of scientific experiments. Familiar with the newly developed branch of mathematics called algebra, al-Haytham analyzed the works of the ancient Greeks and earned credit as the inventor of analytical geometry. He also investigated the properties of light using higher mathematics and physical experiments.

Europeans such as Roger Bacon, who is sometimes credited with being the father of science, and Kepler were greatly influenced by al-Haytham, said Steffens.

"I'm really proud to be the person to bring attention to al-Haytham," Steffens said, adding that he is curious to see the reaction he will get from the Muslim community. "I hope the book is a start of the discussion."

In the Arab world, however, al-Haytham, who is also known as Alhacen or Alhazen, is a hero, said Steffens. His likeness appears on the Iraqi 10,000-dinar note, and Pakistan and Qatar have issued stamps commemorating his achievements. Saddam Hussein even named his missile development center after him, and a moon crater and an asteroid were named for him, too.

"Here," said Steffens, pointing to an illustration on page 110 of his book, "is a front page of a 17th-century atlas of two scientists holding up the book's title page. There's Galileo holding a telescope representing Sensu (the use of the senses) and Ibn al-Haytham holding a mathematician calculation representing Ratione (the use of the reason) ... but while the image of Galileo dropping balls of different sizes to test Aristotle's theory of falling bodies marks the beginning of the scientific age, al-Haytham has faded into history."

Steffens came to writing books for young adults circuitously. Now 52 and remarried with two year-old twin toddlers, Steffens grew up in the San Fernando Valley and majored in English at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn. Then, after years working as a copywriter in the advertising business, he found himself unemployed and living in Escondido.

He offered to edit a number of books for Greenhaven Press and Lucent Books in Rancho Bernardo on a freelance basis, and one thing led to another. "I thought, 'I can write to this age group,'" he quipped. "After all, advertising is geared to the third-grade level." Beginning with a book on the printing press, he was soon authoring books on assignment for various publishers.

Taking him more than a year to write and research, Steffens pitched the idea of al-Haytham's biography to Morgan Reynolds Publishing after he came across the Muslim scientist while researching a previous book entitled Photography in a series called The Encyclopedia of Discovery and Invention. "There's a movement within the library world not to just cover the Europeans," he said. "And there is also a need to create books that work in parallel with school curricula, and they are looking for books about the Middle Ages."

Now after a year of writing and research on al-Haytham's life and works, he is more convinced than ever that al-Haytham has been sorely overlooked, especially in the Western world.

"I started thinking about his place in history and whether he should be in the top 10 with Einstein, Newton, Copernicus," said Steffens, listing some of the world's top scientific minds.

"They all followed the scientific method, but al-Haytham was the man who developed that method, and his book is still true. So maybe I would put him in the top two, or maybe he's even the first."

Contact staff writer Ruth Marvin Webster at (760) 740-3527 or rwebster@nctimes.com.

Fast Facts

Bradley Steffen's book "Ibn al-Haytham can be ordered at the author's Web site at

www.First Scientist.net at the reduced price of $23.75